Science, Possibly Mad
by InsanityOverMadness
Summary: My first Discworld fic, and it's...an AU, crackish one-shot. Nice. Anyways, it's just a tale of science, possibly mad, and a number of other things, starring a mad Doctor and his nameless Assistant. Rated T for some swearing; hopefully this is adequate.


**Disclaimer:** The Discworld universe and everything in it belongs to Terry Pratchett. Not me. Do I look that awesome to you? I thought not.

**Author's Notes:** My first fic and it's an AU, crackish one-shot. Nice. As I'm a bit (read: a lot) of a newb to this site, I hope I'm doing this right and everything's properly formatted and such. Reviews and critique are both nice. So…yeah. That's about all I have to say. Read and enjoy.

* * *

Imagine the universe.

Imagine everything in it. Imagine the worlds, the suns, the stars, the galaxies.

Now imagine if one thing had changed. Imagine if this caused a number of things to change. Imagine if each of those things had changed in a different way, causing more changes and more possibilities. Imagine that, for each change - for each small different decision made or event occurring - there was another universe, entirely the same, but for that one change.

Now imagine an infinite number of these universes, slightly and yet wildly different from each other. Perhaps a yellow sun was never born, perhaps an idea never struck a man and another world was never created. The possibilities and universes are endless.

If your brain is hurting, this is perfectly normal and called the multiverse theory.

Of course, people's choices do matter. Some universes are just not possible when a number of variables are put into the machine and the lever is pulled.

So what lies ahead is a tale from a universe that never was, never is, and never will be - a tale from the far reaches of space and time, a story of science, possibly mad, and a number of other things.

It starts like this.

* * *

"They talked about me behind my back at the Guild. They said I was _mad!_" muttered the man under his breath as he paced around his laboratory. His mostly-white labcoat flapped around his feet as he walked impressively. The man had had it designed that way, after all.

His Assistant sighed. The Doctor - as he requested to be known, although most of the residents of the nearby city called him "that loony bastard that lives in the abandoned tower, over near the hubward gate, see?" - may have been threatening his own life and the lives of his wife and son with something he called a "Raye-Gonne". But this was just going too far.

And besides, the maniacal boast wasn't supposed to come up in the script until Page 4. Maybe the Assistant's theory was right - the mad Doctor did something to reality around him, probably without noticing.

"But they'll see. Oh, they'll _all_ see," continued the mad Doctor, his voice getting louder. "I've got everything ready for tonight!" he shouted, stopping in his tracks and gesturing dramatically towards the roof of the tower and, far above, the window to the sky. There were clouds, and an ominous rumble of thunder.

The Assistant didn't mention that really _he'd_ been the one to get all of the pieces of the body from the five different crypts and sew them together. According to what stories had been passed down over the years, people were _extremely_ hesitant about the man doing something like rising from the grave.

People didn't believe in that anymore, though. And it had all been disproved, in any case.

Meanwhile, the mad Doctor was getting to this subject himself. "They said that you couldn't rise a person from the grave! They said that that was all legends! But I'm going to show them! I will bring the dead back to life, _this very night!__!_" A roll of thunder accompanied this statement, to obey the laws of drama, of course.

The Assistant wondered whether he should try to calm the mad Doctor down. _Everyone_ knew that more than one exclamation point meant a diseased mind. Of course, it was necessary for the Doctor to be a _little_ insane. It was part of the profession - you can't have a mad scientist without the mad. But three or more was definitely pushing it from "a little mad" to "completely bloody loony," at which point the Doctor would probably be rambling about how he was a god and had created new life.

The mad Doctor had outlined it himself when he was going over his plan with the Assistant. He wasn't creating new life; just giving it the energy to get back up itself. Still, it was a long shot. "A million-to-one chance," the Doctor had said, "but it might just work." It had sounded like he was reading off a script, and the Assistant wondered if he had. The mad Doctor wasn't supposed to have a script; nobody was. The Assistant had obtained his through some incredibly dubious methods, involving a few walls smashed, some bribery, and a handy potato.

Apparently they hadn't even designated to give him, the Assistant, a name. The Assistant felt slightly miffed by this. He knew perfectly well what his own name was. Presumably before repeating it to himself he'd get interrupted somehow. To test this theory, he thought clearly, _My name is -_

"Assistant!" cried the mad Doctor. "Raise the body!"

"Yes, Doctor," said the Assistant. Theory confirmed. He walked over to the crank near the table upon which the body was laid. For decency's sake, the Doctor had had the Assistant cover the corpse's _parts_ with some spare underwear. The Assistant wasn't exactly sure where _those_ had come from. Maybe they were radioactive, or the result of a past failed experiment. The Assistant hadn't been with the mad Doctor for long. He seemed to go through Assistants awfully quickly.

"Ah..." the mad Doctor murmured contently. "It's all ready. Tonight, I'll show everyone. I'll show _the world!_" The Doctor interrupted his speech to throw in a long and, the Assistant thought, quite impressive spurt of evil laughter while thunder rolled.

Wait a second.

Three exclamation points. Oh, bugger.

"Er, Doctor..." the Assistant said uncertainly. Three exclamation points wasn't in the script. At least, not the last time he'd checked. He had only an hour or two between running around, doing what the Doctor wished, to skim through it, but even _then_, he couldn't remember reading this. Perhaps it had something to do with that "might be altering reality a bit" theory.

Apparently the Doctor's true name wasn't revealed until the last page. That was interesting. Especially since it made the corpse -

"And what better place to start than..." The Doctor paused. "What?" he barked.

"You just used three exclamation points to end a sentence. Sure sign of insanity."

"Well, I _am_ a mad scientist, in case you didn't notice," said the mad Doctor a bit testily.

"Yes, but. _Three._ It's going a bit too far. As your loyal and faithful Assistant, I'd advise you to, maybe, tone it down a bit?" Adding in "loyal and faithful" was a nice touch, the Assistant thought.

"Hmm. Damn, I suppose you're right." With one last sidelong glance at the Assistant, the Doctor said, "As I was saying...what better place to start than reviving...my own ancestor? Hahahahahaha!"

The Assistant nodded to himself. That was what the script said, complete with two exclamation points and an ominous boom of thunder from the skies above. Now there was just a bit of gloating to do, then he'd be ordered to throw the switch that would call down the lightning. The Assistant was a bit curious about if it would work or not.

"Not even Leonard of Quirm ever attempted such a bold and dangerous experiment as this," continued the Doctor, right on schedule. "But tonight, I'll show the world that _I_ am the greatest mad scientist that they will ever see! _Throw the switch!_"

"Yes, Doctor," the Assistant said calmly, a sharp contrast to the mad Doctor's raving. He took a few steps to the left, where a blatantly obvious switch was attached to the wall. Something to do with "narrative causality," the Doctor had said. The Assistant pulled it without another word.

A crash of thunder, louder than any of the rolls or booms before, tore open the sky. Lightning crackled through the clouds. Then, accompanied by another crashing roll of thunder that made the previous one look like a pin dropped, a bolt of lightning struck.

There was a lot of smoke and coughing after that.

"Well, Doctor?" the Assistant asked after waving his hand around in a vain attempt to clear the smoke. "Did it work?"

"I can't see in all this bloody smoke, you idiot!" the Doctor said somewhere in the smoke. "I wasn't expecting the smoke, though; chances are the electricals got fried."

To the Assistant, this sounded like a lot of what he called "doctor-speak", so he simply said, "I don't know, Doctor. I guess we'll see when the smoke clears."

After a while, the smoke cleared.

The body was still on the table. It wasn't doing much.

"Gods _damn_ it," swore the Doctor. "I was sure it would work." The mad Doctor paused. "Oh well," he said, oddly calm about this failure. The Assistant had a feeling he was used to them. "Back to plotting. And I had such a good speech that time, too."

"I was wondering about that, Doctor," the Assistant cut in. "Why do you prepare speeches for each experiment?"

"Narrative causality," the Doctor said simply. "Experiments work better if I go on a long tirade beforehand about being a bloody brilliant mad scientist."

The Assistant nodded. More doctor-speak. "Now what do we -"

"_Where. The hell. Am I._"

The mad Doctor and his Assistant turned as one to the table.

The corpse was sitting up. It was _sitting up._ And also poking the places where the Assistant had stitched it - well, "him" now, the Assistant supposed - up with a stony expression on his face. "And why do I have _stitches_?" he continued. He paused, then groaned. "Oh, no. Don't tell me I'm a bloody _zombie_."

The Doctor snorted. "Don't be silly. The existence of 'zombies' was disproved decades ago."

"Not bloody likely, if I'm now walking upright. I remember dying. I _remember_ it." The not-a-zombie frowned. "There was...some chap with a scythe, I think. Talked funny."

The mad Doctor snorted again. "Don't tell me you saw _Death_."

"Might have been. Might have been," said the not-a-zombie thoughtfully.

The Doctor muttered something about "bloody ancient fools," then continued with, "So. What shall I call you?"

"I already _have_ a name, thank you," said the not-a-zombie testily. "And it's Commander -"

"Fine," interrupted the Doctor. "You'll be the Commander."

The Commander sighed and rolled his eyes. "We're on a rank basis here, then. Fine. Fine." He paused. "So now that I'm alive...again, I suppose, what are you going to do with me?"

"Well, I suppose I'll have to perform some tests on you -"

"Oh, no," said the Commander."I'm not interested in any tests."

"Then I suppose I could just...bring you down to the Guild, have my demands be met, that sort of thing," the Doctor said thoughtfully, looking up at the window to the sky. In accordance to the laws of drama, the skies had cleared and a full moon was shining down on his face. Goggles could be seen, placed above his forehead.

He looked back to the Commander and the Assistant, who didn't have much to say. "Yes. We'll do that."

* * *

"...and, oh yes, I'd like to be President of the Guild," the mad Doctor said, smirking as he pointed the Raye-Gonne.

The current President of the Guild of Mad Scientists, a young woman known to some as Silverblade, looked calm. She'd been through this before. "You know, Doctor, you needn't have threatened me with your weapon. Raising the dead is a monumental achievement by itself, most certainly worth Presidency." She sighed regretfully. "And I had almost worked it out myself. Alas."

The Doctor's smirk grew. "Perhaps you didn't have the right electricals."

"Some materials were not available," said Silverblade. "I trust you were behind that?"

"Of course, milady." The Doctor gave a mocking bow, still pointing the Raye-Gonne at her.

"Hmm." Silverblade looked down at the papers on her desk. "I suppose I shall have to sign something to hand over the Guild. May I?" The Doctor gestured an affirmative with the Ray-Gonne, and Silverblade sat and started writing on a piece of paper.

"I, President Silverblade," she read aloud, "give up the Presidency and the Guild, and hand it over to..." She looked up. "I'm sorry, Doctor, but I don't know your name."

The mad Doctor scowled. "Do you _need_ to know it?"

"Well, yes. Full name, please."

The Doctor sighed. He never liked handing out his name. It didn't sound like a mad scientist's name. He was tempted to change it, but never quite gave in. The Doctor had heard there was some young up-and-coming man in the Guild with swirly goggles that called himself "Doctor Insano," but _that_ was about as subtle as a brick to the face.

"It's Vimes. Doctor Samuel Vimes," The Doctor said after a sufficient pause.

Behind him, Commander Suffer-Not-Injustice Vimes groaned. "You're _my_ descendant? Really?"

Still holding up the Raye-Gonne, the Doctor turned his head towards the Commander. "But of course, Commander."

And Doctor - not Mister, not Commander - Sam Vimes laughed.


End file.
